Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIII - Review

Today I bring you my thoughts on a Koei Tecmo release called
Romance of the Three Kingdoms XIII (ROTTK). By just looking at the title you
can assume it is the 13th title in the series, just to note all the
games in the series aren’t named simply Romance
of the Three Kingdoms 1, 2 ,3 etc. For historical value it must be stated that Romance
of the Three Kingdoms is a video game series based on a historical novel first
published in 1925, with the first instalment to the series coming to us in
1985.

ROTTK very much feels like it has an association to the Dynasty
Warriors franchise, funny that being the same developer and set in the not so
fictional past of China. The factual and history elements come through very
strong in all of these titles so ROTTK is no different so even if you have only
dabbled in the Dynasty Warriors games a lot of characters will feel familiar.

ROTTK is heavily composed in vein of a city simulator, not
to the point of construction but with a heavy emphasis on the day to day runnings
of a given ruler. This is introduced to us in Hero Mode, Hero Mode is one of
the game modes but serves as a very in depth 10 to 12 hour tutorial of all the
workings of the game. It is here we become familiar with all the options we
have as a ruler whether it be diplomacy or conquest.

The inner workings of the diplomacy aspect can at times feel
very overwhelming with a decent amount of required attention span not only to
take in what we are learning but to also read all the text to gain a notion of
the given narrative. Now this by no means is a knock but more of a heads up as
to the amount of reading that will be required to full appreciate the quality
of work that has been presented to us. The 3 main goals as ruler is good economy,
population happiness and the overall strength of your forces. All these are
obtained by a courting process with given characters and effective relationship
building, not unlike politics of today with 1 glaring difference, loyalty can
be bought with a lot less in this title.

As I have stated building relationships within this game is
paramount, a lot of it can be done by just talking and buying gifts for said
delegates but others need a little more convincing. This is primarily done with
a game mechanic I never seen coming. It is done in a turn based combat fashion
but in the disguise of an oral debate. One must overcome his
opponent/counterpart with the applications of his wit, so basically turn based
combat in a nutshell but without any simulated violence. This debating mechanic
is often used when trying to sway a rival kingdom to join you as an ally and
when also negotiating a timed truce.

When diplomacy is null and void naturally it is time to
negotiate by other means. By these means I do in fact mean violent conflict. To
remain aligned with the rest of the game even the combat and battles in this
game are civilised in nature. They take on a real time strategy (RTS) approach.
This gives you a birds eye look at the battlefield and lets you negotiate the
surrounding variables and try to make decisions based on what you have i.e.
forces and numbers as opposed to what your overall goal is. 1 time boosters are
also an element here as with the other games mentioned before and can be used
to turn the tide in battle, these are primarily gained via good leadership and
savvy decision making.

Every movement or “turn” in this game is gauged by a time
system meaning that a given action will take said amount of days. This is not a
primary factor most of the time but other variables in the game lend themselves
to timed based restrictions. With these restrictions in place it makes it
important to train a good following of people within your close circle and
maintain their needs in order to upgrade their abilities in a given field to
help maintain the work load. It is with this in depth mechanic that really
generates the need to be very well switched on and helps to promote this game
as strong role play experience.

I must admit initially I thought to myself I hope I did not
need to play 1 through 12 first but that is not necessarily the case but in
order to fully appreciate any improvements on the series of course it is a
must. As for someone like myself who is diving in head first into this series
at the 13th instalment I have to say I didn’t feel overly hindered
by my lack of experience. As Koei Tecmo have done so many times in the past is
to bring us Westerners a very polished oriental experience that has a lot of
historical value. All translations are complete and unbroken and often
delivered with the raw emotions of what was initially portrayed.

This is a title that will keep you entertained and entranced
for a long time if this is one of your favoured genres and/or historical
timelines. I feel very confident in recommending this as a strategy role
playing experience, if it is fast paced action and skipped cut scenes you are
after this is definitely not for you. I would love to hear your thoughts on
this title either in the comment section below or across at our Facebook page.